Markt
The Markt is the customary name for the marketplace, a city location. Overview The party can bank, buy and sell Items, and obtain quests from the factors during the day. During the night, the marketplace can be the objective of espionage quests commissioned by rivals in other cities, and a source of training in Stlh and Artf for party members. See section Markt - Nighttime further down. Once per day when visiting the Goods Merchant, Foreign Trader, and Herbalist, there is a small chance that the merchant will propose a mission. It is impossible to turn it down, but there is no penalty for ignoring it. These quests can also be sought from the Fuggers, Medici, and Hanse. Obtaining them is contingent on the party leader's Chr, SpkC, and Local rep, and the probability is capped at 50 percent. Goods Merchant Carries a random selection from the following gear: : Quality of these items is adjusted by an integer; for example, Berlin is '-2'; Lübeck is +5. The items on the list with a confirmed use somewhere are the rope, grappling hook, lockpick, harp, and flute. Foreign Trader There will be random selections from several different lists: *'Weapons and ammo' - listed below in this section, always 25q. *'Gear' - listed above, always at the default Quality values listed above. *'Ingredients' - listed in the next section. Some weapons are not sold here: the hand axe, composite bow, crossbow, arbalest, iron handgun, and brass handgun. The foreign trader does not sell Armor, either. : Herbalist *Differs from what is available at the foreign trader. Together, these two sources constitute what ingredients are sold at a city. *The Alchemist, Physician, and University in a city will have the exact same inventory as the Herbalist. But inquiries made at these other vendors have skill checks and risks. : Leihhaus Pawnshop wares are 17q, and are ideal for new (or broke) parties. The selection is drawn from several lists: * Gear - as listed above, with a quality adjustment of '-8'. * Weapons - as listed above for the foreign trader, except that composite bows and missile device weapons may be sold here. * Armor - listed below. : Banks *A letter of credit shields the party's gold from over-large fines, bribes, and theft. Despite what the Medici and Fugger clerks advise, the notes of the competing banks are interchangeable. The game lumps them together. *A problem with the system in Darklands is that there is no such thing as a partial withdrawal. Money can be converted into notes piecemeal, but when withdrawing gold, the bank cashes all the party's notes and collects its 2.5% fee on the entire sum. *The party can also make deposits to fine-tune big donations. Tithes to the Kirche should be from a wealth of at least 25 florins, but having a lot more than this on-hand will make no difference. Donations to the Cathedral yield 1.2 DF per 1 florin, to a maximum of 30 DF from donating 25 florins. Hanseatic League This is a big merchant guild. Its operations are opaque to the party, but quests can be obtained in the guildhall. It is unclear what effect, if any, a brash versus a polite mannered inquiry has. If the assigned quest is a Raubritter, the Hansard offers to send a knight along, as a fifth party member, to accompany the group. Nighttime The Markt is the most risky quest destination. Ultimately, the heroes must choose between a non-zero chance of becoming legal fugitives in this town, or a non-zero chance of losing 4 Chr on their best artificier. A decision is order on whether the quest's rewards are worth even the mere possibility of these kinds of outcomes. The first step is getting past the guards: *The base chance of sneaking unassisted into the offices is 30%, or 10% if the guards have been alerted by a previous attempt in the past 7 nights. The chance appears to be modified by the Stlh of the last two party members on the roster. *The potions in ascending order of effectiveness are Noxious Aroma, Eyeburn, Black Cloud, and Breath of Death. Black Cloud might keep subsequent attempts on the offices from getting harder, whereas the other potions always trigger an increase in security. *Praying to Saints Christina, Dismas, Gregory T, or Jude, or just bribing the guards, always works. *Retreating to the main or side street can increase party members' Stlh, or, if they are caught there is a chance it gives them a fugitive status in the city, which the other options do not do. The second step is to break the lock on the correct office, get the documents, and get out. Of the four offices in every city, exactly one will have a poison gas trap that will permanently damage a character. Which one is determined by the game's random seed, and it will never change. Of course there is no indication which one it is, and no way to find out without approaching the office and using artifice, which could trigger the trap. *With the lockpicking option, the artficier will either: :#Disarm and bypass the trap without any indication that it was there; :#Detect the trap and back off; :#Trigger the trap. :Odds are determined by the best Artf in the party. *With the Eater Water option, the trap will go off if it is there. So the party should find out before trying this. *The Thunderbolt option will bypass the trap but alert the guards. There is a chance of: :#Failing to find the documents during the frantic search and getting attacked; :#Finding the documents, but failing to get out in time and getting attacked; :#Finding the documents and getting out before the guards can attack. :In the first two cases the party's Local reputation plummets and its legal status in the city goes foul. Odds are affected by the party's Agl. A partywide application of Quickmove is recommended. There are extremely fast training opportunities in Stlh and Artf for parties with stacks of Black Cloud and Eater Water, at a marketplace holding quest documents. Using a potion to get past the guards at night is very low-risk and repeatable. Once inside, the party can repeatedly use Eater Water on one of the offices that have neither the documents nor the trap, and continually train Artf (at extravagant cost, since it consumes Eater Water potions). City Markets All cities have a marketplace; all marketplaces have a city. Many cities in the empire have their own proper names for the site besides Markt: Category:Locations Category:Quest-Related